Clinical Programme

There is a clear need for a better tolerated, safe and effective chronic oral therapy for the treatment of autoimmune disease. The most effective and widely used disease-modifying treatments are currently biologicals directed towards TNFα.

These require intravenous administration (in the case of Remicade) or subcutaneous administration which is inconvenient and there is a risk of injection site reactions. Anti-TNFα treatment is also associated with increased risk of infection and malignancy and is not effective in all patients. Furthermore, antibody-based treatments are often not durable because of the formation of blocking antibodies, and often require switching to alternative therapy after 12 months.

We anticipate that an orally bioavailable RORγt inhibitor will be a safe and effective treatment for symptomatic relief and disease modification of autoimmune conditions such as psoriasis, ankylosing spondylitis and inflammatory bowel disease.